Keiji Maeda

My name is Alex, i am a new member of the Samurai History group, and I
hope to be more involved in the group ion the future, but for now I
was wondering if a certain samurai was fact or myth, the samurai in
question is Keiji Maeda I have been serching for information for a
long time, and everything I find always contradicts other information
I have already found. I am being driven crazy over this, so i was
wondering if you guys could help me out and try to set me straight on
this subject. Thanks for your help.

--- uesugi1545 <Nra371@...> wrote:

> My name is Alex, i am a new member of the Samurai
> History group, and I
> hope to be more involved in the group ion the
> future, but for now I
> was wondering if a certain samurai was fact or myth,
> the samurai in
> question is Keiji Maeda I have been serching for
> information for a
> long time, and everything I find always contradicts
> other information
> I have already found. I am being driven crazy over
> this, so i was
> wondering if you guys could help me out and try to
> set me straight on
> this subject. Thanks for your help.

Can't say I blame you--after a quick search, I came up
with a billion hits for Onimusha or other video games,
but only found one or two things that had any claim to
reality. 2 sites mention the "Toshiie to Matsu" NHK
drama from 2002. Apparently Maeda Keijiro made an
appearance in one episode, though it doesn't explain
much. While it is a TV show, generally the NHK dramas
can be viewed as "mostly" historical, and so I'd
assume that he was a real person.

A little while later I found this site:
http://shungansho.fc2web.com/meguruhito/maeda.htm

I've not got the time to get out the denki jisho and
translate it, but a brief glance shows he was an
adopted son of Maeda Toshiie, and at the time of
Sekigahara served Uesugi Kagekatsu.

Hope that helps.



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While doing some research on Akechi Mitsuhide, I came
across a website that lists his daughter Hosokawa
Gracia's original name as "Tamako". I'd always thought
her Japanese name was "Tama", no ~ko. I noticed also
that many of the women's names mentioned in Sansom
(just finished volumes 1 and 2 recently) have the ~ko
suffix, which I always thought was a rather modern
phenomenon, dating largely from the beginning of this
century. While I know ~ko names existed back
throughout history, I didn't think it was all that
common. And then I see "Tamako" instead of Tama, so
know I'm wondering if this is a "modernization" after
the fact by some historians/authors/whomever, who
assume that all Japanese female names have a ~ko (and
haven't been following pop Japanese naming trends,
with the proliferation of Amis, Ayumis, Ais, Hatsumis,
Juris, Nanas, Sayuris, etc.) so they just added it on
their own. I'm fairly sure Mitsuhide's daughter was
"Tama" with no ~ko.

Any thoughts?



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"for now I

> was wondering if a certain samurai was fact or myth, the samurai in
> question is Keiji Maeda I have been serching for information for a
> long time, and everything I find always contradicts other

information

> I have already found."

Keiji was a real person. He was born under the name Takigawa in 1540
and died in 1612. He was the adopted son of Maeda Toshihisa (brother
of Maeda Toshiie) and became a ronin after Toshiie took over control
of the clan (seems as if he was a great fighter but lousy at
following orders). Around the time of Sekigahara he served the Uesugi
under yet another name, Hyottosai Kokuzoin. After Sekigahara he
became a ronin again. Like Yagyu Jubei (and to an extant Musashi),
his wanderings as a ronin and disappearances from mainstream history
led to a lot of idle speculation and exaggerated stories.
Game designers sure like him-he's been in Kessen along with Samurai
Warriors and the Onimusha series.